For the first time in campus history, a team of Peninsula College cybersecurity students competed in the Pacific Rim Collegiate Cyber Defense Competition and placed eighth out of 14 teams. The event took place at Highline Community College in Des Moines, Washington March 21-22.
– Photo courtesy of Dana Hogenson
Here’s the scenario that the teams, who came from Washington, Idaho, and Oregon colleges and technical schools, faced for two days:
Imagine you’re an employee of your region’s Center for Disease Control. You’ve had just a couple hours of experience on the job, and foreign hackers have decided to conduct an all-out attack on your entire system of infrastructure. Now, add the chaos of a full-blown zombie apocalypse to the mix.
“If the Collegiate Cyber Defense Competition sounds like your hardest day at work, you’re right,” says Joshua Diehl, one of the eight students on the college team, “But it is also an extremely enjoyable, high-level challenge that tests the cumulative capabilities of your team’s skill set and ability to work together.”
Eric Waterkotte, faculty advisor to the team, said the competition was both “a confidence booster and a humbling experience.” Students Robert Chisick, George Delorey, Joshua Diehl, Ian Hassel, Michael Loghry, Sarah Mullikin, Drew Ross, and David Walter were proud to achieve eighth place when competing against the likes of the University of Washington, Western Washington University, and Idaho State University.
They were still humbled, however, by the group of hackers (a.k.a. “red team”) who managed to exploit a few vulnerabilities. According to Joshua Diehl, “The red team is a group of over 75 industry professionals who ‘hack for a living’. They spend their workdays finding security issues on behalf of well-known industry leaders such as Cisco, Microsoft, Juniper, and Boeing.” One of the more devious attacks from red team was carried out by infiltrating the Peninsula students’ area and inserting a flash drive into one of their computers. Unauthorized individuals attempting to enter the workspace, as well as a phony maintenance employee, distracted the team while another person crept in and inserted the device.
Other industry professionals from companies like Raytheon, T-Mobile, Nimble Storage, Deloitte and Splunk, along with recruiters from military cyber divisions, were also in attendance to meet with future prospects and observe how they perform under pressure. With the growing threat of cyber attacks we’re facing today, a great number of outfits are on the lookout for talented defense specialists.
For more information, contact Eric Waterkotte at ewaterkotte@pencol.edu or call (360) 417- 6270. Footage of the competition can be found on YouTube by searching “CyberFed Episode 11”.